


Red And Black

by Craycrayskittlez



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Action, Drama, F/M, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-03
Updated: 2013-04-13
Packaged: 2017-12-07 09:03:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/746729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Craycrayskittlez/pseuds/Craycrayskittlez
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Enjolras loves Eponine, Grantaire loves Enjolras. What happens when Grantaire agrees to help Enjolras win over Eponine and everyone except Grantaire and Eponine seems to think that G/E are a couple?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

-Eponine-

Papa hit Azelma again. Her cheek is bruised and her back appears to be bleeding. Did he use his belt on her? No, he wouldn't use his belt on her. Right? I mean- Azemla is their favorite child, it's not like they try hard to hide that. It's obvious to anyone with half a brain. I know he would hit her, he would hit his own mother. But using his belt? He used it on me a few times but never Azelma.

"It's fine 'Ponine," she insists. "Just leave it alone," she says. But I can't. What did Azelma do anyway?

"Just tell me what happened Zelma,"I plead

Azelma is only a year younger than me, she's not stupid. She knows I won't drop this.

"Promise you won't do anything? Father will do worse to you and you know it," she asks, her voice has gone high from crying.

"I promise Azelma, but I have to know. And this has to end soon, before he beats us to death."

"Father was angry… when you were at the meeting. He said that he promised you to 'Parnasse and you have to… meet him tomorrow night."

"Why would you keep this from me Zelma?!" I exclaim, a little too loudly.

"What are you talking about?" Papa yells from downstairs. "You back Ninny?" Ninny is his pet name for me. He uses it in front of customers and 'business associates' to make them think that I mean something to him. We're at the inn so there will be a lot of customers -idiots- to fool.

"Yes Papa!" I shout loudly, trying to hide how scared I am.

"I'll talk to you about this later Zelma, it's important," I whisper urgently.

"Come down here Ninny, I need to talk to you," he says, trying to sound innocent. I am about to get the beating of my life. Better me than Azelma, I tell myself.

"Okay Papa!" I reply running down the stairs. What will he use to beat me this time?

"Ninny," Papa says as I come down, he glares at me.

"I need to talk to you, you little-" He's cut off when a rich looking customer comes through the door.

He's come here before, to recover from his hangovers I suppose. Grantaire.

He's one of the members of the friends of the ABC/ a bunch of silly school boys who are apparently fighting for 'slum like me' but don't even talk to most of us.

Grantaire talks to me, so does Marius. The rest occasionally talk to me, but not often. The biggest hypocrite of them all is their leader, Enjolras. He never talks to us. He says hi to me a few times, but he says it coldly and I can tell that he has no interest whatsoever in talking to me. He looks at me constantly at the meetings, I disgust him that much? He always makes me feel so insecure and uncomfortable. Honestly, sometimes I doubt that he's a human. The only feelings that he shows is love for is precious Patria and of course, passion for the stupid little rebellion.

I think Grantaire only goes to the meetings for alcohol and to talk to his friends. He's usually always drunk, but he's actually alright when he's sober. But I've known him for years and I've only seen him sober… I don't know, ten times?

"Hello Monsieur!" my father exclaims, rushing over to Grantaire. He knows how to get money from anyone, Grantaire is very rich.

"Bonjour Mademoiselle," replies Grantaire with a grin. Is he being rude or is he really drunk? People know better than to mess with Papa, he's feared all over Paris. Not by the law obviously, but he owns the streets of Paris.

Papa glares at him. "Do you want a room?"

"Yes, why thank you so very much Mademoiselle." He's just trying to annoy Papa now.

"Ten francs a night," Papa says gruffly.

"That's very expensive, Mademoiselle." He sees me and gives me a wink.

"You don't want a room?" Papa grunts.

"No, I'll pay," he replies with a smirk.

"Half upfront," Papa orders while Grantaire hands him seventy francs.

"I want a week, all paid up front," Grantaire replies. I gasp. Grantaire knows what it's like here, Papa will try to take all of the money from Grantaire that he can, he knows that. He usually only comes to recover from hangovers and he usually just keeps in his room for that. But a week? Grantaire has a house, so why?

Even papa gives a slight gasp. "A week?" he asks.

"Yes. Is there a problem with that, Mademoiselle?"

"No," he says, probably doing everything that he can not to punch Grantaire, I can just imagine the anger boiling up inside him. Being insulted by a drunk in front of customers and more importantly his 'business associates'/ his gang of thieves who rob innocent people, that includes poor people with hardly a penny to their name. Papa takes every little thing they have.

"I'll be going to my room then," he replies calmly with a hint of that smirk that he gets whenever he wins something that he really should have lost, or of course when he makes a highly respectable or feared man look like the complete idiot that he really is.

Grantaire may be a drunk, but he doesn't miss much, he notices the tiny things that drive each person completely mad. With Papa there are a number of things, he gets very angry easily so making him mad isn't a very hard job. Azelma and I seem to make him angry just by breathing.

And of course when this is happening, Mama is flirting with some rich man, taking money from his pockets while they're in what would appear to most people as a kiss full of passion and love, but I know Mama, she's very good at tricking foolish me. I try to sneak upstairs, hoping that Papa will forget about it all.

"'Ponine!" Azelma exclaims. "Are you okay? Did he hurt you? What did he do to you? What happened? I heard shouting- who was it? There was a new customer wasn't there?"

"God Zelma, one question at a time maybe?" I reply with a small smile.

"Fine," she huffs. "First question: are you okay?"

"Yes," I laugh.

"Did he hurt you?"

"No."

"What did he do?"

"Am I under interrogation now?"

"If that's what you want to call it, yes. What did he do?"

"I don't know, he was going to do something when a drunk customer came."

"Okay… and-"

"No more questions Zelma, I can't take much more, I'll just tell you everything that happened. And if you insist on asking more questions when I'm done ask away, but I'll probably only know as much as you." I then tell her everything that happened.

"Why would he buy the whole week?"

"God Zelma." I repeat, "I know as much as you about this."

"Why don't we ask him?"

"He's drunk, Zelma. It's best to stay out of his way."

"In the morning?"

"No. Not that soon, what about the afternoon?"

"Fine 'Ponine," she replies, climbing into bed.


	2. To Love Someone You Shouldn't

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the Thenardier girls integrate Grantaire

-Enjolras-

I wonder where Grantaire is. We share a house so he should be back. We share a house to save money, but admittedly, we have more money than we need, although having extra money isn't really a bad thing, university fees are getting more expensive. I hate to admit it, but I miss the drunk. He's good to talk to, even when he's drunk. I figured he would be recovering from a hangover in his room, but he's not around.

He's good to talk to when he's drunk because he can't remember any of it when he's sober and I really don't want the world knowing some of the things that I say, my secrets. Everyone has secrets no matter how big or small. But everyone has that one big secret that they wouldn't even tell a drunk, or even a baby.

Mine, for example, my father is a murderer who escaped from prison two years ago after he was sentenced to death. He came to my house to stay, he stayed here for a month, but then it wasn't safe to stay any longer. There was that inspector Javert who was always snooping around, especially to any members of the friends of the ABC.

As the leader of friends of the ABC he stalked me often, in disguises. He seems like a smart man, but he doesn't know that I would recognize him anywhere.

I pride myself on knowing my enemies, Javert being one of the major threats. I watch what I say or do very carefully when he's around, one slip and it's over.

Just imagine, you're walking on a very old bridge that's over a volcano, the bridge could fall at any minute. You would fall into the volcano at one false step. With Javert, one wrong word and I'm sent to prison, maybe everyone in the friends of the ABC. You can never be too careful.

I honestly have no idea where my father is now, but I know that he's alive. Murderer or not, he's my father and it was self-defence. The first killing was when a man came to him with a knife, he flipped the man, grabbed the knife and slit his throat, I saw it. I was only eight.

The other murders were when the police were trying to arrest him, he said he wanted to protect me, said I would die if he went to jail, said I would be sent to live on the streets and I would die there.

He was eventually captured after three years on the run. He escaped prison after nine years and came to find me, I was better off without him, he realised that and left, leaving me a note explaining everything. I haven't seen him in two years now.

If that man didn't randomly attack him, none of this would have happened, why did he have to choose my dad? He may not have been the best father but he was better than my mother, I haven't seen her in five years. I used to visit her house often but we never really cared for each other, I was angry at her because she abandoned me and father when I was only six.

Father was wrong, I survived without him, mother sent me money. I don't know if I could have survived without her though.

I've told my friends that father is alive and lives with mother, she remarried.

-Azelma-

"Eponine? Eponine!" I shout, trying to get her out of bed.

"What Zelma?" she asks, sounding tired.

"You've been asleep for ages, its afternoon."

"So? Papa doesn't want me does he?" she asks nervously.

"No!" I answer quickly. "We were going to talk to Grantaire."

Eponine smiles, she does that smile when she figures something out.

"And why do you care so much?" she smirks.

"I just wanted to know why, you know..." I answer quietly.

"Hm…" she says, looking like she's trying not to laugh. "Why can't you like a guy who's your age?"

"Huh?" I stutter.

"Don't pretend Zelma, let's go talk to him quickly then."

How does she find out everything? I'm not that obvious am I?

She walks out of our room, going to the room where he's staying, I run out of our room following her.

"Wait up 'Ponine!"

-Grantaire-

There's a loud knock on my door, waking me up. For an inn so expensive it's not very good service. I decide to ignore it, but they're not very patient and eventually they open the door themselves. It's the Thenardier's daughters, Eponine and Azelma, I do need to talk to Eponine about Enjolras, I promised I would help him. But I'm so tired...

"Go away," I throw a pillow at them and dive beneath the covers.

"That's rude." Says Azelma.

"Why thank you, I try," I smirk, I don't need sass from a little kid.

"Azelma wanted to talk to you," Eponine explains with a smirk. Azelma gives a mad, bright red blush.

"You don't need to hide that you want to talk to me," I say with a grin at Eponine.

"You wish, Grantaire," Eponine smirks.

"I need to ask you something," Azelma states, looking nervously between the two of us.

"Have fun you two," Eponine grins as she leaves the room.

I really don't want to talk to her.

"So you wanted some of this?" I ask, pointing at myself.

"No," she says quietly, sounding like a tiny little chipmunk. Her blush turns an even deeper red.

"So...What?"

"I just… um... wanted to know why you bought a week to stay here, you have a house."

I resist the urge to punch her square in the face.

"I have to talk to Eponine."

"Oh," she says quietly, she doesn't question me further asking things like "But why did you have to buy a room here for a week?" or "why do you need to talk to her?

"Do you want me to get her?" she asks.

"Yeah, thanks." She hurries off to get Eponine.

"What?" Eponine snaps.

"I just needed to talk to you, sweetheart."

"I don't have any business talking to drunks."

"Okay, I won't be drunk." I state.

She doesn't say anything but the confused look on her face tells all.

"I have a friend.." I start.

"You finally made a friend, I'm so happy for you," she interrupts.

"That's not very nice." I say, putting on an overly dramatic pout.

"Why thank you, I try," she says, mocking my earlier words.

"I really need to talk to you Eponine," I say, I should get this over with.

"I'm listening," she says, sitting on my bed.

I promised Enjolras that I would try to get them together. I promised him, I can't back down now. She's perfect for Enjolras, I think. Despite how much I love my Apollo, I want him to be happy.

"You know Enjolras right?" I ask.

"The one with the speeches," she confirms.

"Yeah, well he was wondering if you wanted to meet with him sometime." God I suck at this. Next time I'll repeat word for word what Enjolras says, maybe I shouldn't have gotten drunk when he told me that, I can't remember a word of it.

"He was?" she doesn't seem to believe me.

"Yes," I reply, "I don't know what for, but you could find out," I lie.

"Okay," she replies, "oh and don't go near my parents unless you want to lose everything you have with you." And she leaves the room.

"No Grantaire, she belongs with Enjolras, Enjolras will never love you," I tell myself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please Comment!


	3. Moving Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eponine and Azelma finally move away from the Thenardiers.

-Azelma-

What did Grantaire want with Eponine? What did they do? Eponine looks like a mix between happy and surprised.

"What happened?" I ask.

She just laughs. Why's she so annoying sometimes?

"Please Eponine," I plead, which is greeted by more laughter

"Stop shouting Zelma," she eventually says. It's irritating how calmly she says it.

"Tell me then."

"It's none of your business Zelma. Now shut up before papa hears."

Eponine can be so stubborn sometimes. But I've learnt not to argue with her, if she's going to tell you something she'll tell it to you exactly when she wants to, no sooner no later.

-Enjolras-

Where the hell is Grantaire? He's been gone for ages. Combeferre will probably know, for some reason he seems to know everything that's going on.

"I heard he's at the Thenardier's," Combeferre answers. "What do you want with him anyway? He's probably drunk again."

"I need to ask him something," I answer.

"Well you'll need good luck if you want him to be sober," he warns as I exit the café.

I don't need to ask him anything, but he's usually not gone for too long. And honestly, I need his help for arranging the meeting, I know why he's at the Thenardier's though. I know the Thenardiers, they'll try to take every single thing I have with me, I'll have to sneak past them. They would probably make me pay just to visit Grantaire.

"I was wondering when you would come asking," Grantaire greets as I enter the room.

"Why are you here?" I ask, playing dumb.

"I did tell you I would help with Eponine, didn't I?"

"Yes," I quietly answer. I feel so stupid, getting Grantaire to 'get a girl' for me.

"She's going to meet you at the café tonight," He grins.

"Did I say I was okay with that?"

"Come on Enjolras, she'll be at the meeting and you can actually talk to her when it's over."

"I don't like fixed up dates, Grantaire."

"It won't really be a date."

"What then?"

"Just talking."

"Ok…"

-Eponine-

Azelma won't stop asking me what happened. I love Azelma but she never knows when to shut up. Eventually, I can't take it anymore and leave the room. It's not worth seeing papa so I knock on Grantaire's door. There's a pause and I can hear muttering.

"Who's that?" asks Grantaire eventually.

"Eponine," I answer impatiently. There's another pause and I can hear more muttering and shuffling. Eventually someone opens the door. It's not Grantaire.

"Bonjour Eponine," says Enjolras.

"Hello Enjolras," I reply. "Can I come in?"

He looks behind him, probably at Grantaire, I can't see past him. "Okay," he replies, nodding his head slowly.

"Thanks," I say, walking in. "You wanted to talk to me? Since you're here you could now."

"Yes," he confirms, I can't stop staring at his eyes, they're so blue. He looks at a bruise on my cheek. "What happened?"

"Oh, it's nothing," I say nervously.

"It's something, so what?" Grantaire asks.

"Shut up Grantaire," snaps Enjolras. There's a look of sadness in Grantaire's eyes.

"I should go," I say, leaving his room quickly.

"Eponine wait!" Pleads Enjolras. but I don't listen.

-Grantaire-

If Enjolras really doesn't know how Eponine got the bruise he must be almost as thick as Marius. Everyone knows that Thenardier hits them, that's why Gavroche ran away from him.

"You know he hits her, right?" I ask when I can't stand Enjolras' glaring anymore.

"Of course I know, but how could I not mention the bruise?" He replies.

I don't know what to say for once.

"We need to take her away from here and bring her sister too," he says.

"To stay with us?" the idea is almost laughable.

"Yes… Maybe… Yes," he answers, sounding unsure of himself.

"And how do you intend to do that?" I scoff.

"If I can get them to agree, we'll sneak them out."

"If they agree." I repeat.

"Can you ask them? I don't know which room is theirs."

I laugh a little bit. "Ok, but you really are hopeless Enjolras," I reply, leaving the room.

He opens his mouth to say something, but stops himself.

I knock on their door, almost immediately it opens.

"Grantaire!" Azelma exclaims.

"Hi Azelma, can I talk to you and your sister?"

She smiles. "Okay! Come in."

When I go in, I don't waste time. "Your father hits you."

"Only sometimes," Azelma says quietly, giving Eponine a nervous glance.

"Don't Zelma, yes he hits us. A lot. Many people get hit; many get worse. What's it to you?" Eponine asks.

"Well, Enjolras and I were wondering if you wanted to stay with us instead," I answer.

"Thank you!" Azelma exclaims.

"Papa won't let us," Eponine states simply.

"We could sneak you out," I answer.

"See Eponine? It's fine," says Azelma.

"We don't want to be any trouble," Eponine says, giving her sister a look that could kill.

"You won't, please?" I ask.

"Please Eponine?" Azelma asks.

Eponine pauses, thinking. "Okay," She sighs.


End file.
